


Run Boy, Run

by Rubyya



Category: Run Boy Run-Woodkid (song)
Genre: Songfic, Spooky Story Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-26
Updated: 2019-10-26
Packaged: 2021-01-04 02:03:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,513
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21189743
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rubyya/pseuds/Rubyya
Summary: What happens when one kid just wants to break free from it all?





	Run Boy, Run

The radio crackled as the words came out. “He’s escaping! Call in all guards not currently on duty! He’s running to the west! Capture him alive!”

**“Run boy run! This world is not made for you”**

I was born different. I had purple eyes and yellow hair. People thought I would bring death and destruction to those around me. And so they shunned me. They wanted me gone. They wanted death to be gone. But I couldn’t grant that wish. I wanted to live. I wanted to do all the things people did. I wanted to be normal.

**“Run boy run! They're trying to catch you”**

My feet pounded on the concrete. I was running. Away. From people. From this facility. From myself. I had to run. I had to keep going. Men in white coats were following me. They wanted me to go back. To go back to the tests and medicine smell. I can’t. It’s not living if you can’t do what you want. I’d rather die, and so, I run.

**“Run boy run! Running is a victory”**

The man poked and prodded me. On my legs, knees, head, arms, everywhere. It hurt. I wasn’t allowed to say anything. The last time I complained I lost food privileges for two days. I knew the needle was coming next. It always came after examinations. The fluid was a bright pink, the only color in I ever saw. Day after day this happened. This monotony.

**“Run boy run! Beauty lays behind the hills”**

I loved the outside air. It felt like freedom, even though I was about as free as a caged bird. When I started running, I didn’t know where I had wanted to go. Then I saw the hills and the sun slowly setting behind them. I wanted to go there. I had to go there. My feet followed my mind and I ran to the hills. To the rolling hills promising freedom.

**“Run boy run! The sun will be guiding you”**

Every morning I saw the sun rising up from my window. It’s light illuminating my jail. It’s warm light. The sun let me pretend I was free. Let me pretend I was on a grassy hill and was just taking a nap. Now, as I ran, I followed the sun. It was telling me to go to those hills. I followed without question.

**“Run boy run! They're dying to stop you”**

“Your test scores are optimal.” the doctor said.  
They always told me their names but I never tried to remember them. Too many names and not enough feelings to care. Plus, they had taken my name away from me. It was important to me, but now it’s gone.  
“What does it matter?” I would always ask.  
“You will bring us into a new age!” he replied, “The better your test scores the better the new age will be!”  
These men were crazy. I would never bring them into a new age. I wanted my old age, my old life back.

**“Run boy run! This race is a prophecy”**

“Every god has a story,” my friend would always say, “Just because everyone thinks they act one way doesn’t mean they have to.”  
At first I didn’t pay attention to her rambling. She was just a way to break up the facilities schedule. Then she ran away. It was so out of her character. She hated resisting. I don’t think she ever even said anything bad about anything. But she ran away all the same. Then the facilities captured her. The doctors made me watch as they stuck a needle of that damn pink liquid into her. My friend smiled the entire time, her bright smile so out of place. Her body toppled over, the smile still on her face.

**“Run boy run! Break out from society”**

When I was on the streets there was an old man that gave me food that would have always gone to waste. I didn’t appreciate him enough. He was probably the only thing that kept me from starving most of the time. The last time I saw him we got in an argument. It was all my fault. It ended with me running into the town, my eyes wide open, my hood down. Lady luck wasn’t with me that day. I ran straight into a police guard. Without any time to put my hood back on, he saw my hair and eyes. That was the last time I saw the outside world. I was six.

**“Tomorrow is another day, and you won't have to hide away. You'll be a man, boy! But for now it's time to run, it's time to run!”**

The sign of death was such an old rumor that no one knew where it had come from. People held on to that story and passed it down generation after generation. When I was younger I thought it was because people wanted to remember where the bad things had come from.  
As I got older I realized we were scapegoats. People could blame every death in war or every person the military killed, they could all blame it on us. People believed the stories and passed them on as if they were history. As if one person could cause thousands of deaths in a war. The government fed these rumors. If they captured us they would be praised, problems forgotten. They could use us to do anything and no one would care.

**“Run boy run! This ride is a journey too”**

I had never imagined the wind could feel so good. I had cursed the wind for messing with my robe and revealing my hair, but now it helps me. The pursuers have their bullets fly off course. They fly past me to land on the hard concrete. Their duty finished. Like I would have been. This facility would have thrown me away like trash if I had disappointed them. Like I was disappointing them now. But the wind didn’t let me give up. I had started this run and I was going to be damned if I didn’t finish it.

**“Run boy run! The secret inside of you”**

“Everyone is special in their own way. You just have to find yours,” my friend would sometimes say instead of her usual rambling.  
I didn’t feel special though. I felt like a prisoner against my will. Which was exactly what I was. As I’m running now, I feel different. I feel free. My whole body is light as a feather. Gravity has no bearing on me. I need to run and so gravity helps me and so I run. Away from my prison.

**“Run boy run! This race is a prophecy”**

I had my aptitude testing today. The doctors are all excited about my results. One doctor said that my whole life would change. I didn’t do much. I just ran around a whole bunch and answered some questions about how I felt. It wasn’t that hard. There were probably a whole bunch of people that also got really good results. One doctor joked I looked like I was going to run away before I was told my result. I laughed at them but it was a good idea.

**“Run boy run! And disappear in the trees”**

Trees. There were the trees. Right there. Here. In front for me. I’m free. I’m free in the trees. I open my arms wide to celebrate me. To celebrate freedom. No more tests. No more needles. No more worrying. No more deaths. I was free within the trees.

**“Tomorrow is another day, and you won't have to hide away. You'll be a man, boy! But for now it's time to run, it's time to run!”**

“Will I ever be free from this curse?” I ask the kid next to me. He’s only twelve but that’s a lot of years older than me. He also has blonde hair and purple eyes like me.  
“It’s not a curse,” the boy says, shifting against the wall, “It’s just a fact of life. We were born like this and so we have to live with it.”  
“But why were we born like this? I didn’t ask for it and my mommy didn’t ask either.”  
“I don’t know. Maybe it’s something our parents ate. Maybe it’s where they lived. You shouldn’t focus on that now though. You should focus on finding our next meal.”  
“But I want to know.”  
The kid laughed and tousled my hair. “You’ll grow out of that.”

**“Tomorrow is another day, and when the night fades away. You'll be a man, boy! But for now it's time to run, it's time to run!”**

“I have a clear shot,” a soldier says, pointing his gun at the back of the escapee.  
“Do it,” his officer says, “He’s lost to us.”  
A small click. Slight recoil. Hit. The bullet hits the escapee right in the heart. The body falls over with a slight thump. Blood slowly leaking out, staining the grass.  
The radio crackled, “Is it done?”  
“Yes.”

**Author's Note:**

> This was an assignment done for my English class in which my only instructions were to make it spooky. At first I didn't mean to kill the kid off but I had two line of song left and had to do something with them. I'm rather pleased by how it turned out.


End file.
